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Now Gujarat poor don’t need to chase schemes, they will come home
Sreenivas janyala
Posted online: Sunday, October 08, 2006 at 0000 hrs IST
AHMEDABAD, OCTOBER 7After several years of waiting, Railiben Babubhai Naik, who belongs to a below-poverty-line (BPL) family, got a house under the Indira Awas Yojna in Ankli village of Devgadh Baria in Dahod district. She was entitled to the benefits for a decade but never got them.
Sigabhai Valjibhai Vasawa of Jharvani village in Nandod Taluka of Narmada district needed Rs 10,000 to set up a provision store. He got it under the Swarnajayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojna (SGSY) in August when officials of the Directorate of Rural Development Agency came looking for him.
Thanks to a new delivery system developed by the Gujarat Rural Development Department, schemes meant for BPL and poor families are now reaching the people they are meant for. “From treating the schemes as ‘quotas’ or ‘numbers’, we are giving them ‘faces’. And the faces belong to the poorest,’’ Vipul Mitra, secretary rural development, says.
‘‘Now, instead of the beneficiaries running from pillar to post to get the benefits, the taluka development officers go in search of them. That is because the system has already generated a list, identified the names of the most needy, with their addresses. The TDO has to go find them and give what is due to them,’’ says Mitra.
In the process, ministers, MLAs, local politicians, panchayat presidents and sarpanchs have been eliminated from the system. Recommendations are not entertained. ``If your name is not in the list then you are not entitled to the benefit. If it is there, then you don’t need a recommendation,’’ says taluka development officer of Devgadh Baria, Dahod, J H Patel who will be handing over 200 houses this December. The system can generate any data based on combinations: All SC families in a taluka, all dalit families not having pucca houses or all families not having means of livelihood. Depending on whom you want to target, the system generates a list.
The database is on the web and almost all districts and talukas of Gujarat now have access to the Internet. The State-Level Bankers Committee which has 5,000 branches of various banks has already adopted the system, using it to disburse government co-sponsored loans for both farm and non-farm activity.
J M Patel, chief manager of State-level Bankers committee (SLBC), Gujarat, says: “It is a very realistic database that is 85 to 95 per cent correct.’’
Over three years, 68.65 lakh rural households in the 18,000 villages of Gujarat were surveyed by enumerators who gathered details of families without revealing the motive. Then, using a selection criteria of 13 parameters prepared by the Planning Commission and using a methodology decided by the Union Ministry of Rural Development, the households were graded.
Earlier, BPL lists were prepared using income as the main criteria. The Gujarat Government added more parameters to make it more comprehensive_average availability of normal clothing, two square meals a day, type of house, status of household labour force, type of indebtedness etc.
As per the 16-point parameters, families were graded_ a score of 16 points or less: very poor, 17 to 20: poor. When the list was finally ready this July, the Gujarat Government had a ready reckoner at hand: 18,706 households scored 5 or less (poorest of the poor), 1,73,388 households scored 10 or less, 8,50,413 households scored 15 or less and 10,93,534 scored 16 or less.
And, the first target was staring in the government’s face_18,706 households with a score of less than 5, in desperate need of help. The system generated their names and addresses and taluka development officers and gram sevaks were sent to find them.
That is how Railiben of Ankli village in Devgadh Baria got the house under Indira Awas Yojna, or, Shantaben Dalabhai Koli is set to receive a house in Jhaab village in the same taluka.
From December, starting with a person or family graded as the poorest and lowest in the new system, the poor will be directly given the benefits After making an informal presentation to rural development secretaries of the states last month at New Delhi, the Gujarat Rural Development Department is making a formal presentation to Union Minister of Rural Development Raghuvansh Prasad Singh on October 9.
But complaints have started pouring in. An MLA who sent 200 applications of his supporters demanding benefits complained that only three persons he recommended were in the list of BPL or poor families. “He claimed our list is incorrect,’’ says D M Baria, of Dangs DRDA. “But now we don’t have to bend over backwards under political pressure. Whenever a politician calls me to recommend, I just show the list,’’ he says.
Print Story
Now Gujarat poor don’t need to chase schemes, they will come home
Sreenivas janyala
Posted online: Sunday, October 08, 2006 at 0000 hrs IST
AHMEDABAD, OCTOBER 7After several years of waiting, Railiben Babubhai Naik, who belongs to a below-poverty-line (BPL) family, got a house under the Indira Awas Yojna in Ankli village of Devgadh Baria in Dahod district. She was entitled to the benefits for a decade but never got them.
Sigabhai Valjibhai Vasawa of Jharvani village in Nandod Taluka of Narmada district needed Rs 10,000 to set up a provision store. He got it under the Swarnajayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojna (SGSY) in August when officials of the Directorate of Rural Development Agency came looking for him.
Thanks to a new delivery system developed by the Gujarat Rural Development Department, schemes meant for BPL and poor families are now reaching the people they are meant for. “From treating the schemes as ‘quotas’ or ‘numbers’, we are giving them ‘faces’. And the faces belong to the poorest,’’ Vipul Mitra, secretary rural development, says.
‘‘Now, instead of the beneficiaries running from pillar to post to get the benefits, the taluka development officers go in search of them. That is because the system has already generated a list, identified the names of the most needy, with their addresses. The TDO has to go find them and give what is due to them,’’ says Mitra.
In the process, ministers, MLAs, local politicians, panchayat presidents and sarpanchs have been eliminated from the system. Recommendations are not entertained. ``If your name is not in the list then you are not entitled to the benefit. If it is there, then you don’t need a recommendation,’’ says taluka development officer of Devgadh Baria, Dahod, J H Patel who will be handing over 200 houses this December. The system can generate any data based on combinations: All SC families in a taluka, all dalit families not having pucca houses or all families not having means of livelihood. Depending on whom you want to target, the system generates a list.
The database is on the web and almost all districts and talukas of Gujarat now have access to the Internet. The State-Level Bankers Committee which has 5,000 branches of various banks has already adopted the system, using it to disburse government co-sponsored loans for both farm and non-farm activity.
J M Patel, chief manager of State-level Bankers committee (SLBC), Gujarat, says: “It is a very realistic database that is 85 to 95 per cent correct.’’
Over three years, 68.65 lakh rural households in the 18,000 villages of Gujarat were surveyed by enumerators who gathered details of families without revealing the motive. Then, using a selection criteria of 13 parameters prepared by the Planning Commission and using a methodology decided by the Union Ministry of Rural Development, the households were graded.
Earlier, BPL lists were prepared using income as the main criteria. The Gujarat Government added more parameters to make it more comprehensive_average availability of normal clothing, two square meals a day, type of house, status of household labour force, type of indebtedness etc.
As per the 16-point parameters, families were graded_ a score of 16 points or less: very poor, 17 to 20: poor. When the list was finally ready this July, the Gujarat Government had a ready reckoner at hand: 18,706 households scored 5 or less (poorest of the poor), 1,73,388 households scored 10 or less, 8,50,413 households scored 15 or less and 10,93,534 scored 16 or less.
And, the first target was staring in the government’s face_18,706 households with a score of less than 5, in desperate need of help. The system generated their names and addresses and taluka development officers and gram sevaks were sent to find them.
That is how Railiben of Ankli village in Devgadh Baria got the house under Indira Awas Yojna, or, Shantaben Dalabhai Koli is set to receive a house in Jhaab village in the same taluka.
From December, starting with a person or family graded as the poorest and lowest in the new system, the poor will be directly given the benefits After making an informal presentation to rural development secretaries of the states last month at New Delhi, the Gujarat Rural Development Department is making a formal presentation to Union Minister of Rural Development Raghuvansh Prasad Singh on October 9.
But complaints have started pouring in. An MLA who sent 200 applications of his supporters demanding benefits complained that only three persons he recommended were in the list of BPL or poor families. “He claimed our list is incorrect,’’ says D M Baria, of Dangs DRDA. “But now we don’t have to bend over backwards under political pressure. Whenever a politician calls me to recommend, I just show the list,’’ he says.
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